A data center is a specialized facility that houses network servers provides data services. In its most simple form, a data center may consist of a single facility that hosts all of the infrastructure equipment. A more sophisticated data center can be an organization spread throughout the world with subscriber support equipment located in various physical hosting facilities. Data centers allow enterprises to provide a number of different types of services, including e-commerce services to customers; extranets and secure VPNs to employees and customers; firewall protection and Network Address Translation (NAT) services, web caching as well as many others. These services can all be provided at an off-site facility in the data center without requiring the enterprise to maintain the facility itself.
Each of the network servers within a data center requires electrical power to operate. Moreover, a data center that houses network servers must include a heating, ventilating, and air conditioning (HVAC) system to regulate the temperature of the network servers. The HVAC system also requires electrical power to operate. Typically, a regional electricity grid supplies this electrical power. However, under certain circumstances, the data center may be unable to receive sufficient electrical power from this electricity grid. For example, the data center's connection to the electricity grid may be severed or brownout conditions may occur. To avoid a shutdown of the data center when the data center is unable to receive sufficient electrical power from the electricity grid, the data center may include one or more local electrical generators that supply electrical power to the data center when the data center is unable to receive sufficient electrical power from the electricity grid.
Local electrical generators may be expensive to purchase, install, and operate. Minimization or optimization of the power consumption of the network servers may reduce the costs associated with the purchase, installation, and operation such electrical generators. Furthermore, minimization or optimization of the power consumption of the network servers may reduce the costs associated with the purchase of electrical power from the electricity grid.